The Hill's Blog Roundup: September 26, 2008

BLOG ROUNDUP - SEPTEMBER 26, 2008   McCain: The Gambler in an Age of Gamblers, Bankruptcies and War   by Brent Budowsky   John McCain says the economy is strong and sound. Days later, John McCain says we might have a depression and cancels his campaign. McCain has not been in the Senate since April. Now McCain airlifts his desperate campaign and presidential politics into the heart of sensitive negotiations on a subject he knows nothing about and has been wrong about for 26 years.   Here is McCain's latest lie: that he wants to deal with the crisis in a bipartisan manner. Obama calls him early Wednesday morning seeking bipartisanship. McCain does not take the call and does not return the call for half a day. He then talks to Obama about being bipartisan and minutes later runs to the cameras to cancel the debate and airlift himself into the crisis. What a phony!   Congress must and will pass a program, though it must be carefully devised, written and done in stages rather than dumping nearly a trillion dollars on the problem ad hoc. But get this straight: There may be a recession but anyone who even uses the word "depression" is either ignorant about economics or outright lying to frighten people to serve their blind financial greed or blind political ambition.   Of course the loud-mouthed traders on CNBC predicting doom and depression without full immediate funding don't tell you this. They are the ones who caused the problem. They are the ones whom taxpayers are bailing out. Their conflict of interest is extreme, and never disclosed. Of course they want all the money, now, because it is an income transfer from hard-hit Americans to wealthy speculators who made bad bets. They are phonies, too, and liars if they try to scare Americans with extreme and hot-tempered talk of fear when what they really want is for scared taxpayers to bail out of their greedy bad bets.   The market is corrupted by gamblers, and John McCain is the biggest gambler of all. The market is corrupted by dishonesty and John McCain is one of the most dishonest candidates in years, reduced to cheap political stunts, erratic extremes on policy, claiming economic strength one day and promoting fears of depression the next, and phony bipartisanship, refusing to talk to Obama for half a day, then running to the cameras. In the America of Wall Street speculators, George Bush, John McCain and Republican economics, we are treated like a banana republic nation with a finance of greed, a politics of fear,] and a bread and circus of falsehoods and deceptions.   Of course McCain does not want a debate, but it is a debate he will have, like it or not, and the question is this:   Do Americans want another reckless gambler in the White House? I think not